


Dulce et decorum est

by EssayOfThoughts



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: (Slightly), Character Study, Gen, Poetry, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-02
Updated: 2017-05-02
Packaged: 2018-10-27 02:07:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10799454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EssayOfThoughts/pseuds/EssayOfThoughts
Summary: “You-Know-Who is growing in power,” Minerva says. “Watching the students in class... more and more of them are whispering his views. He recruited while he was at Hogwarts, Albus, and he and his continue to do so.”“We will fight,” Albus says.





	Dulce et decorum est

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Pomodoridori](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pomodoridori/gifts).



> Written for a prompt on my tumblr, readable [Here](http://essayofthoughts.tumblr.com/post/160241241215/oh-no-er-maybe-he-visits-a-museum-instead-and). 
> 
> While I have been to the Imperial War Museum it was several years ago and I have no idea what the current let alone past exhibits are and were respectively and I cannot be arsed to look it up. While my mother regularly consults their archives for her PhD, the museum itself is rather less of a concern, so I’ve wholly made up the museum content for sake of this fic.
> 
> Not like it matters - JKR used a fair measure of artistic license in some parts of her book so fair play says I can do the same. Things I reference in this fic may be found [Here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gassed_\(painting\)), [Here](http://www.warpoetry.co.uk/owen1.html) and [Here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came_...).

**i.**  
Imperial War Museum. It was quite something of a name, he supposed. The wizarding world, after all, had little by way of such imperials, though, certainly, they had often followed the path of their muggles imperialist efforts. 

But wizarding England had not had quite the empire of their muggle counterpart, and had not partaken in such battles. The Statute forbade it, of course, but if they had... well then, the other wizards would have fought back, and the wars in America had shown the dangers of that, after all the bloodshed Grindelwald had wrought it was easy to see how devastating that would be.

As he walks through the exhibits he can see Gellert’s hand in some of it. Not in the older battles, of course, but on the continent, during his reign...

Dumbledore shakes his shoulders and walks on. He does not wish to dwell on the man he once called friend.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

**ii.**  
“Minerva,” he says, bowing his head. She’s stood in front of a large replica of a painting, men in a row, hands on the shoulder of the man in front, many blindfolded. It’s dated to before Gellert’s war but it is still of war. 

To one side is a poem, writ large.

 _Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,_  
_Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,_  
_Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs_  
_And towards our distant rest began to trudge..._

Minerva nods in turn. “Albus. Thank you for meeting me here.”

He says nothing. If she asked him to meet her here there is something she wishes to ask of him, and it is not something he thinks he knows how to talk of.

 

* * *

 

 **iii.**  
“You-Know-Who,” she says. She’s turned back to the painting, fingers running gently over a leaflet in her hands, the same image printed there. The title is simple _Dulce et decorum est: A meditation on the First World War_

He remembers when it was simply “The Great War”. He even remembers the rest of the Latin - _pro patria mori._

It is sweet and right to die for ones country.

 _No it isn’t_ , he thinks. _It is terrible._

But they have to ask it of their people all the same.

“You-Know-Who is growing in power,” Minerva says. “Watching the students in class... more and more of them are whispering his views. He recruited while he was at Hogwarts, Albus, and he and his continue to do so.”

“We will fight,” Albus says. It is simple - how can they not? Grindelwald was much of a continent away, other Ministries too proud or too scared to ask for help, or, when they did, left in the wake of Gellert’s passing with no trace of the man who had travelled far ahead. The hoops jumped through to find Gellert, to hunt him down, to duel him...

That had taken too long. For all the harm Tom Riddle meant to do, they could at least be certain he was doing so on their home ground, where they could fight back directly.

Through, Albus supposed, it was Tom’s home ground too.

“We will fight,” he says. “We cannot have another Grindelwald.”

 

* * *

 

 **iv.**  
Gellert had made spells that acted like the gas canisters of the Great War. _Noxium Caeli_ , _Spiritus Venenum, Aeras Toxini._   _Gifttod._  Working in so many ways and through so many shields that someone always died.

A poison gas seeping through the ranks, until someone stumbled and fell and choked and _died._

The survivors would have nightmares of it forever.

 

* * *

 

 **v.**  
“Not everyone will want to fight,” Minerva says. “Not everyone wants to acknowledge it.”

Dumbledore nods. “The purebloods stand to _gain_  from it, or so they think.”

“So we talk first to the muggleborns?”

_And have them fight our war for us? In a world they have only just come to know?_

“I suppose we must. Adults, though, not students.”

Minerva’s shock is visible on her face.  _“Never_ students.”

Dumbledore knows though, how, sometimes, the only ones left to ask are children. How sometimes, they are the only ones who will fight. How sometimes, the only ones who fight the fight are those fighting for themselves. What was it Niemöller had said?

_First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—  
Because I was not a Socialist._

_Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—  
Because I was not a Trade Unionist._

_Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—  
Because I was not a Jew._

_Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me._

Dumbledore nods. “Let the others know.”

Minerva nods and turns to go. Dumbledore considers the painting, considers the poem writ large beside it, from beginning to end. 

All the terrors of war - who will fight it? The old who want rest? The young who are the future? Those who must or die?

He sighs, he turns, he, too, leaves the Museum.

The last lines of the poem echo in his mind.

_My friend, you would not tell with such high zest_  
_To children ardent for some desperate glory,_  
_The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est_  
_Pro patria mori._

**Author's Note:**

> Please leave comments!


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